Free An Atlas of Impossible Longing by Anuradha Roy Page B

lover leap on him. Mrs Barnum followed with a scream. Kananbala shut her eyes in terror and opened them a second later to see the lover diving back into his car, driving off. Barnum lay on the ground bleeding from his throat. Beside him, Kananbala could see the moon return the curved glint of a knife.
    Mrs Barnum looked around, her moonlit face spectral. She tore off one of her long earrings and looked down at her hand as if surprised by it. Clutching the earring, she knelt by Barnum’s side for a moment. Then she rushed to the gate and ran in.
    Fortunate, Kananbala thought, that she does not let the watchman lock the gate the nights she is out.
    The murdered man lay on the road, a dark, shining puddle forming beside his stomach as the owls resumed their soft night-time exchanges.
    Kananbala lay down beside Amulya on the far edge of their wide bed and, trying to breathe as quietly as her panting would allow, in her head she began to make up a story.
    * * *
    The next morning Amulya was sitting at a table in the bedroom, drinking his first cup of tea and unfolding his newspaper, when Nirmal raced in.
    Amulya looked over his newspaper with a frown.
    â€œWhat is the matter, Nirmal, can’t you walk? Must you always run? Who’d believe you’re going to be a father?”
    Amulya took a sip of his tea with a grimace, “This tea is overdone, it’s bitter. Who made it?”
    â€œDo you know, Baba,” Nirmal said, breathless, “there’s been a murder in the house opposite. They think the woman killed her husband. He was left dead on the road last night, and she was sitting upstairs brushing her hair, as cool as you please.”
    â€œWhat? Barnum?” Amulya exclaimed. “That can’t be!”
    â€œNo really, Baba,” Nirmal said, “It’s true. Haven’t you looked out of the window at all this morning? There’s mayhem. I saw some police high-up go in and there are three more policemen in the house, searching for the weapon.”
    â€œWeapon? How was he killed?” Amulya asked, standing up to go to a window, curious despite himself.
    â€œKnife,” Nirmal said with satisfaction. “In the stomach and ribs, apparently. The police are taking the lady away for questioning. She keeps saying she was out for the evening and when she came back she went straight upstairs, didn’t know anything about this, hadn’t expected her husband back for another week.”
    Nirmal stood at another of the windows and looked out, his tall body in its thin, night-crumpled kurta outlined by the sun. Kananbala went and stood beside him. She noticed that her head did not reach his shoulders and looked up at Nirmal with a surge of pride and indulgence.
    â€œIsn’t it good riddance that man died? He was a real son of a pig,” she said to him, tender, confiding.
    Amulya snorted. “He certainly looked like one! One bad Shaheb less! Maybe the woman will go away from this big house now and … ”
    â€œMost likely they’ll put her in jail. Or send her to the Andaman Islands,” Nirmal said. “The British have jails even for their own female killers … and Mrs Barnum is only an Anglo … they really hate Anglo-Indians, don’t they?”
    â€œThey do have special jails,” Amulya said. “I think they have special jails for British criminals … in the hill stations.”
    â€œSo their murderers are not troubled by the heat?” Nirmal laughed.
    Amulya gave his son a disapproving frown and continued to look out of the window at the house opposite. A minute later, he put his glasses back on and returned to his newspaper.
    Nirmal stepped back from the window. “The police are coming towards our house!” he said.
    â€œI want to meet the police,” Kananbala announced.
    Amulya put his glasses down with a clatter and abandoned the newspaper in a heap on the table. It fluttered across the room in the breeze. He